Homework 2

Outline New Labour's Educational Policy since 1997.

Labour was elected in May 1997 in the way of new policies of education.They focus on education in a global market and view education and training as crucial for economic success.

Labour inherited 196 specialist schools from Conservatives. By 2007, there were over 2500 specialist school in England. The idea of specialist schools is to provide centres of excellence and expertist in particular subject area, and raising standards of teaching and learning in these areas.

However, it has be criticised rising standards may be due to the additional government funding or a growing middle-class intake.

Labour accept competition between schools would raise standards and school league tables as a means for parents to assess a school`s performance. But, despite the league tables, parents tend to accept the original measure, which is the exam results.

Part of Labour`s education policy was based on social democratic views with an emphasis on equality of opportunity. It aim to "overcome economic and social disadvantage and to make equality of opportunity a reality." And they introduced a range of measures designed to raise standards in low-income , inner-city areas. These included Sure Start which aimed mainly at pre-school children and had disadvantaged area of England, Education Action Zones that located in deprived urban areas with low levels of educational attainment, Excellence in Cities and Academies which is to raise achievement is deprived areas by replacing poorly performing secondary schools.

Labour has attempt to reduce inequality of educational opportunity by increases the number of students and the proportion of working-class students in Further and Higher education.

Vocational education and training are introduced to for a high wage or high skill economy, and reduce unemployment.GNVQs(general national vocational qualification) were replaced by vocational GCSEs and vocational A levels to raise the status of vocational qualifications to the level of academic qualifications. NVQs( national vocational qualification ) were extended to raise skill levels in a wide range of jobs. However, surveys suggest that many employers see little value in these qualifications, the government might overestimate the demand for highly skilled jobs.

Labour introduced the New Deal in 1998. It offered education and training for young people between the age of 18 and 24 who had been out of work for more than six months, it was later extended to older people.

Homework

Marxists, those believe that economic system shapes the rest of society, therefore, educational system is shaped by economic system.

• ruling class ideology
• School transmit an ideology which states that capitalism is just and reasonable.
• School prepare pupils for their roles in the workforce.( to be obedient, punctual, had qualification)
• Education reproduces the next generation of workers for capitalism.
• Serveral close correspondence between social replationships in the classroom and those in the workplace.( Bowles and Ginitis)
• The relationship between teachers and pupils mirrors the relationship between bosses and workers.
• School, like the capitalist society, are based on hierarchy.
• Capitalist society is unequal, different the class of origin, different educational qualifications and jobs they are going to get.

Feminist, they focus on gender inequalities in society.

• Gendered language.
• Gendered roles . School textbook tended to present males and females in traditional gender roles, women as mother and housewife.
• Gendered stereotypes, reading schemes tended to have male bias.
• The hidden curriculum reinforces gender socialisation.
• Subject choice. Girls` subjects had lower status and lower market value.
• Discrimination. The pass mark for boys was set lower than the pass mark for girls.
• Teachers gave more attention to boys.
• Sexual harassment of girls and women teachers by male pupils is a major feature of mixed schools.

The New Right. They think market forces should be introduced into schooling.

• raising educational standards.
• Competition between schools and colleges.
• Allow schools and colleges become self manage.
• League tables to show comparative results for schools are published.
• Parents have the right to choose schhol
• Restore enterprise and initiative.

Interactionist. They focus on the interaction between pupils and teachers and between pupils and pupils within the classroom

• Labelling and self-fulling prophecies
• setting and streaming
• Teachers play an important role in the success of their students.
• Some pupils reject the value of school
• Peer groups are seen as having considerable influence on some pupils.

Sociology homework---researching school and teachers

First of all, the research methods are triangulation, which means that it combine different reserch methods and different type of date in order to check the validity and reliability of their finding. In this case, They are using both quantitative data and qualitative data, closed questions ,which the different rating are set, the respondent simply has to choose one, it is easy , quick and cheap to classify and quantify.
However, the researcher provided limited information of schools and teachers, it might let respondents feel uncertain about which school or teacher it is refering to. Picture of teachers seen to be unneccessary, how about the picture and address of school?
There will be a relatively low response rate, ( If Mr.chris did not told me the web-site, i will never find it out) and respondents did not obtain much qualitative data.
Respondents might interpreted different meaning towards questions and answers. Such as helpfulness of teachers, some respondents might view the helpfulness as all student matter(family problem and life outside of school etc) or some might view it particularly helpfulness towards study, such as homework only.
These closed questions might seriously limit what respondents want to say.
Are the data availble in the web-sites reliable? The aim of this research is to provide the real facts of school, but what if the school itself is rating it, will that present a false picture of the school?
And sometime the data shown might be confuse, the respondents, in instance, the students most probably cannot rating teachers in a balance point of view. Eg, a student might be favour to one teacher and another are not, then the rating number may appear two extreme, thus it is confused.


There are some advantage by using internet to carry out such research.

• Inexpensive--no interviwers to pay, cheap to classify results.
• It is possible to survey a large sample.
• Fast and efficient analysis possible with pre-coded closed questions.
• Answers are obvious ( can be understand easily) and easily quantified.
• The most important--No interviewer bias. The interviewer does not influence the respondent`s answer. In this case, it is really important to the respondents when they are accually jusifying their school and teachers.
• Save time. When set up an internet research, researcher might simply put it aside and do other research at the same time.

Sociologists

Rosenthal & Jacobson ( Self-fulfilling prohecy)

Students with poor expectations internalize their negative label , and those with positive labels succeed accordingly.



Paul willis ( Anti-school subculture)

The lads` anti-school subculture is shaped mainly by their expectations about the jobs they hope to get and by the working-class subculture they bring with them to school.



Education doen not turn out an obedient workforce. some kids from an anti-school subculture and cope with school and then adult work by mucking about.



William Lobov (language deprivation)

Working class children speech patterns were not inferior to standard English, they just different.Those who saw them as inferior simply failed to understand the black dialect. he made this conclusion by examing the low-income of african-american children.

Carl Bereiter

The speech pattern from low-income children are inadequate to meet the demands of the education system.

Basil Bernstein

identified two speech pattern. restricted code and elaborated code.

Swann Report

language didn`t afftect progress for later generations.



Daniel Defoe

errr..published novel <<>> ( i only found this...strange..)





Talcott Parsons

School is a bridge between the family and adult roles of society.That`s it, the main agency of secondary socialisation.
Role allocation as main function of the educational system.
Bowles and Gintis
Reject the view of role allocation, as social background influences the most.

today`s mock test

I had a U in today`s sociology test, it made me feel very depress indeed. i know i must do Mr.chris homeworks now, and cannot hope it is luckly that he did not check-.-

Now i know all the sociologists` name are important, i would remember them as well as what they said...

Relationship and processes within school

In school, the relationship between teachers and students seems to be very important for the effectiveness of education. Since social class influence in educational attainment the most, so as this. Teachers tends to share an image of 'ideal pupil', whereas teachers perceived middle-class(MC) pupils as closet to the idea, and lower working class(WC) pupils as furthest from it. Label is a major characteristic placed on a person by others. Teachers tends to label MC as 'able', 'good student', this may discourage WC pupils. When a pupil labelled as 'bright',others will tend to respond to them and interpret their actions in term of this label, there is a tendency for a self-fulfilling prophecy to result. Teachers assume MC pupils were highly motivated , well-discipline and able. And they tend to think WC pupils as disruptive and lacking in parental support.According to Gillborn & Youdell, teachers systematically discriminated aganist WC pupils.



In genernal, teachers perfer to teach pupils they see as able, hard working and highly motivated, therefore, a positive relationship might be built up between teachers and pupils. Otherwise, vice versa.



Pupils tends to bring their subculture to school. First of all, pupils subculture are the distinctive norms and values developed by groups of yound people in schools. White, male, MC subculture tends to be two extreme. Pupils in the top stream well-behaved, always praised by teachers. Pupils in the bottom stream refusing to do homework and smoking,drinking. White, male, WC subcultures. The lads just think the school is waste of time, they want to leave school as soon as possible. White, female. subcultures seems that their resistant to schooling is less than the male, however, their exaggerated femininity might sometimes wrote school off. In Davies`s words ' Girls accentuate their femininity in exaggerated displays of physical maturity and hyper-concerns with romance on the one hand,and prioritise domestic roles such as marriagem household duties over schooling on the other hand. African-caribbean, male subculture, they tends to bring Black street culture into the classroom which it can be seen by teacher as disruptive. African-caribbean female subculture. They are pro-education, ambitious, determined to succeed, aming for well-paid jobs. There is anti-school subculture, which defined by Paul Willis.According to him, it is mainly shaped by their expectations about the jobs they hope to get and by WC subculture they bring with them to school.For instant, It is those who rejected the values of school, a lack of respect, behave badly, having a laugh and looking after their mates etc. It usually happens in bottom steams and among the WC pupils.



The hidden curriculum refers to the messages schools transmit to pupils without directly teaching them or spelling them out, it consists of values, norms, beliefs and ideas which are embedded in the normal routines and procedures of school life.In Functionalist views, the transmission of society`s core values can be seen as part of hidden curriculum.Such as the value of individual achievement, pupils are encouraged to achieve good grades, qualification, it prepares them to achieves as individuals in the wider society.In Marxist view, the hidden curriculum of schools is the transmit rulling class ideology, produing next generation of workers schooled to accept their roles in capitalise society.



Label is a major characteristic placed on a person by others. Teachers tends to label MC as 'able', 'good student', this may discourage WC pupils.When a pupil labelled as 'bright',others will tend to respond to them and interpret their actions in term of this label, there is a tendency for a self-fulfilling prophecy to result.



There are two types of teaching group, ability group and mixed ability group. Ability groups are pupils who seens to have the similar ability. Setting and streaming are two ways to dividing pupils into ability groups.The idea is based on young people have different abilities,therefore, they should be taught in different level, different speed and have different exams. Mixed ability groups are those randomly mixed in terms of their perceived ability. by doing this, they reduce class differences and class conflict.